Category: What’s it Like?

From SCBWI British Isles Members. It’s the 20th anniversary of the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators. It’s the only largest organisation for published AND unpublished writers in the world and I’ve been part of it for years. Holding hands with fellow writers as we climb through the snowdrift of rejection letters to publication has…

The very obvious answer is to pay a professional but hey, most of us live in the real world. Paying a professional web designer may be desirable, even sensible, but it’s also far more expensive than free. Author advances can quickly be gobbled by such expenses. If you want to build a free site for yourself, but…

Want to know my action plan on how to be media savvy? How to strategise promotions on social media? Well, sorry, but you’re in the wrong place. Having people try and sell me stuff makes me want to scream. This is more a reminder to be a human. Most humans are great. Let me introduce you to…

Writers are asked this ALL the time. And the truth is, ideas come from everywhere, you just have to be receptive to them. Listen to conversations for the hidden under tones, read newspaper articles with a writer’s eye – ask: “What if?” at every possible situation. I find trying to force ideas quite hard but…

It’s been three weeks since More of Me was launched and I am well aware my attention to this blog has been SCANT. I am ashamed but I also have no idea where to start in sharing what it’s been like. It’s been crazy. So I’m taking a little writerly advice and am “showing not telling” everything…

I have tried to write a sensible “week before launch day” post. Honestly I have tried . The thing is, I AM TOO EXCITED TO EVEN SIT STILL On Monday very many of my friends and family will be joining myself and Usborne to celebrate the launch of More of Me in London. That is genuinely enough…

Here are a few unknown unknowns – things you need to do as a published author that you never even guessed at: Blog posts, heaps of them , which is GREAT, because I am a massive chatterbox and they allow me to chatter. I’m blogging at Notes from the Slushpile , YAshelfies, and on all sorts of…

Every year I think this year’s conference has been the best ever but this year, it really might have been. Was it just me or did we fill Winchester with enough warmth and creativity to power a small ship? And what about it really blew my mind? Was it our fantastic, if bonkers, keynote speakers…

This is just a brief post through a blur of happy tears, and it’s aimed at you, those people reading my blog who have been climbing the same mountain of drafts and redrafts and rejections and workshops and how-to books and support groups and critique sessions and are thinking I’ll never make it. I know…

I’ve done it, more-or-less. More of Me is finished – there’ll be the possibility of minor tweaks when the proof copies are ready but all the tough writing stuff is done, including the final stage, COPY EDITS. My Facebook pals, and worse, my Twitter followers (why don’t they let you edit tweets? I never see…

The annual SCBWI British Isles conference is open for booking and I didn’t hesitate before signing up. I’ve hardly missed one in years – in fact I’ve been trying to remember if I’ve missed one. Sadly, no one has helpfully produced a list so I can’t tick them off.